Mississippi Jail Deaths Probed

Nation & world

WASHINGTON — The Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department is investigating the hanging deaths of 47 inmates in Mississippi jails, an agency spokeswoman said Wednesday.

''We're gathering information - including the testimony from earlier hearings - to determine what would be the appropriate federal action,'' Obern Rainey said. She said the investigation is being conducted by the criminal section of the Civil Rights Division, but she would not speculate on whether federal indictments might be sought.

The investigation was ordered by Attorney General Janet Reno.

''How could that many people die?'' the attorney general said Tuesday. She directed federal investigators to ''try to get to the bottom of it.''

The six-year string of suspicious deaths came to national attention last August with the hanging of 18-year-old Andre Jones in a jail cell in Simpson County, Miss.

Local officials called the death a suicide. Federal officials could not prove otherwise, but doubts lingered. He was the 42nd such jail cell death since 1987, and the deaths now total 47.

About half of the dead inmates were African-Americans.

President Clinton said last month he was ''very much concerned about the deaths in the jails.''

Reno said she wants the cases revisited to determine ''whether there is any evidence of criminal activity that should be further pursued.''

Even if no wrongdoing is found, she said, the investigators should find out ''if there is any pattern to this tragic number of deaths, to see what could be done to prevent something like that in the future.''

She suggested better internal surveillance of inmates or redesign of the jails might be needed.

Last month, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights also urged Reno to investigate not only the deaths but ''what appears to be a pattern, to determine whether there have been outrageous violations of the constitutional rights of persons held in custody in Mississippi jails.''

Rainey said she could not comment on the investigation or give the range of possible federal actions.